Quirky linguist loved life, and Ruth for 70 years

They spoke Esperanto at home

When Ruth Moline decided she wanted Sidney Culbert's hand forever, she said the three magic words, the phrase that would make her man's heart flutter, then soar:

"Teach me Esperanto."

And with that, Sidney was hers.

The pair -- she taught high school in Tacoma and he was a respected linguistics and psychology professor at the University of Washington -- remained together 70 years until his death two weeks ago at 90.

"He was a remarkable man," said his niece, Joyce Morehead, 50, of Tacoma. "A true original."

And it wasn't just his encyclopedic knowledge and devotion to the obscure 19th-century language that set him apart. Look at the arc of his life, friends and family say, and it reveals a person who always looked at the world in his own terms. (And, of course, Ruth's terms too.)

Born the son of a brick mason in Miles City, Mont., Culbert was an unusually bright child. After his family moved to Tacoma in 1923, as a teen he built a shortwave radio so he and his sister, Betty, could listen to updates of the Charles Lindbergh solo flight across the Atlantic.

A standout student at Stadium High School who was disdainful of sports, he regularly organized the neighborhood children into performing Shakespeare plays. "He was putting on 'Titus Andronicus' at 14," said nephew John Terrien, 53, of Tacoma.

"And he made damn sure people knew their lines."

After graduation from Stadium -- where he first became friends with Ruth -- he worked part time for the post office and on a tramp steamer.

When he'd save enough money, Culbert would take a full-time semester of school at Puget Sound College. Out of cash, he'd go back to work.

On one freighter trip to Brazil, he fell in love with the Portuguese language and soon became fluent. He transferred to the University of Washington and studied language and psychology, specializing in the study of perception. He skipped his master's degree and went straight into his doctoral work.

He completed his university education in 1950 and was offered a job at the school. "He always said he never got a master's degree because he couldn't afford it," Morehead said.

During these years, his two loves blossomed: Esperanto and Ruth.

A creation of Dr. L.L. Zamenhof, a Polish doctor, Esperanto first was promoted in 1887 as the world's second language that would allow everyone to communicate. Simple to learn with single sounds for all of the letters and basic sentence construction, it was hailed as smart, but it never caught on widely.

One place it did was in the Culbert household. Ruth, relatives say, shared Sidney's passion for the language and loved to say that she knew he had him when she asked to learn it. The two always spoke it at home.

Culbert loved Esperanto's 16 specific, inviolable rules. For instance, every noun ends in "o," and every adjective ends in "a."

"They taught it to us when we were little," said Terrien, who with his sister Joyce lived just down the street from his uncle. "We knew it then but not now."

The Culberts formed an unusual couple. Childless, they doted on their nieces and nephews. They loved to dance and they loved to travel. In public both always dressed stylishly; Sidney in his sport coat and white turtleneck, Ruth in something brightly colored and classy. "I never once saw him wear jeans," Morehead said.

They seldom skipped ballroom dancing every weekend night at the now-closed Top of the Ocean in Tacoma. Ruth always said the pair probably never would have married except that in 1958, the couple -- already together for nearly 20 years -- were denied a shared stateroom on the Queen Elizabeth II because they were unmarried.

"His intellect was incredible," said Gardlin, who took Culbert's psychology of perception course, among other classes with him. "He was witty and I never heard him speak ill of anyone and I've known him since 1958."

But for a man who was reputed to be fluent in 20 languages, it was in Esperanto he loved to linger.

Not only was he known worldwide for his study of the language -- international Esperanto message boards on the Internet lamented his death -- in his house, files were labeled in the language. Even his Honda had a custom license plate: SALUTON.

It means hello. It was how he and Ruth answered the phone every time. At home, they didn't speak English unless they had company.

"He was a gem," said Les Kerr, who along with his wife and daughter took Esperanto classes from Culbert.

"A wonderful man."

To the Esperantists who hung on his every word -- even the ones they tripped over -- he was something more: "fidela, sincera subtenanto de internacia komunikado kaj amikeco."

Translated into a language he preferred less, it means a "faithful and sincere supporter of international communication and friendship."